There has been proposed a known image forming apparatus, the image forming apparatus includes a replacement unit that can be mounted to or dismounted from a frame member (a side plate of a main body of the known image forming apparatus). In one example disclosed, the replacement unit is a process unit including development cartridges, etc.
First electrodes are disposed on an inner side face of the frame member. Conversely, second electrodes are disposed on an outer side face of the replacement unit. The second electrode has a contact portion formed of a cup-shaped metal member (having a U-like shape in cross section) and a coil spring for biasing the contact portion against the outside (toward the frame member) of the replacement unit.
In this image forming apparatus, when the replacement unit is mounted to the frame member, the contact portions of the second electrodes are made to contact with the first electrodes, thereby being electrically connected. As a result, electric power can be supplied from the electric circuits of the main body to the replacement unit.
However, since the contact portion of the above-mentioned second electrode is formed of the cup-shaped metal member, it is difficult to reduce the production cost of the contact portion. For this reason, it has been considered to reduce the production cost by replacing the cup-shaped metal member of the contact portion with a contact portion formed of a metal wire bent into a shape along a plane.